Become a successful gambler
By Andy Thompson
July 2005
Betting with your heart instead of your head is a surefire route to punting purgatory. But, as pro gambler Andy Thompson explains, just a few small changes in your approach can conquer your demons and turn losses into winnings.
So what is it that really makes the difference between a successful punter and a losing one?
A network of well developed informants and contacts? Hours of research and statistical analysis? The ability to spot value when others can't?
While all of these are often able to give the very best gamblers an all-important edge, the real secret to long term profitability may well lie a lot closer to home. Because, according to some of the world's leading professionals, the reason most punters fail to turn a profit each year is almost entirely down to the guy staring back at them in the mirror.
It's your own approach to gambling that ultimately will determine whether you're successful or not. Whatever the betting medium, most gamblers are more than able to apply a high degree of skill and knowledge to the basic principle of making the right selections. Even the mug punter in the darkest recesses of your local betting shop knows what it takes to find a winner at least some of the time.
But in truth, backing winners is only half the battle. The problem for most punters is finding the mental strength and discipline to ensure that they remain in long term profit - in other words, they fail to find the resources from within themselves to make sure the winners they pick out add up to more than the losses they incur.
Self destructive behaviour patterns such as chasing losses, placing 'interest' bets, which is effectively placing a bet while watching a live event to add a little bit more entertainment, and increasing stakes after a winner are the sort of habits guaranteed to keep us working for a living, and our bookie friends sipping cocktails in the Bahamas.
If you think there's a magic formula that allows professional gamblers to win money all the time while the rest of us wallow in a pit of losses, you're wrong. That's why making changes to your attitude and mental approach can make all the difference.
Finding that edge'Most professional punters have an edge of some sort through which they hope to keep themselves ahead of the game,' said semi-professional gambler and The Observer's racing correspondent, Eddie Freemantle, 'but in my experience the gap in knowledge between a pro and a recreational punter is surprisingly small.
'The main difference between us is really the professional has learned to cope better with the psychological demons that afflict gamblers, and which all too often force them to throw their hard earned profits away.'For most people, the most ferocious of those 'demons' will always be the age-old weakness of chasing losses. It's a familiar story. A string of consecutive losers leads to a big hole in your betting bank. Suddenly you find yourself placing bets you would never have even considered at the start of the day, just to try and get your money back. Usually, the results are predictably disastrous.
No matter how successful you are, there simply can't be any punter to whom it hasn't happened at some time. What makes punters want to blast their way out of trouble? Psychological expert Steve Code has a theory. 'From our very early years,' he said, 'men in particular are taught that to succeed in life we have to be good at what we do. In many ways our achievements at work define who we are as people. If we are successful, we feel fulfilled, rewarded and contented.
'For most gamblers, it's a similar mindset. Most of our friends and family know that we enjoy betting - no doubt ask us for a tip on occasion - and just as in our working lives, we want to be perceived as successful at it. So when we have a bad day gambling, it's that instinct that kicks in.
'After a disastrous week in the office, most people wouldn't just go home; they would stay at their desks until they had put things right. It's the same for punters. No one wants to walk out of the betting shop or turn off their computer a loser. So we chase our losses in an attempt to put things right - not just for our bank balances, but also for our own self-esteem.'
Turning off the tiltSo if we know that chasing losses will usually lead to disaster, how do we stop ourselves from going 'on tilt' as it's known? 'It's important for anyone hoping to make money from betting to be able to see the whole picture rather than just one individual day's betting,' said Tony Bloom, professional gambler and chief executive of football betting specialists Premierbet. 'The truth is there is never a last race, and a run of losing bets should only ever be seen as a temporary blip in a long-term sequence of results. Like all punters, I have soul-destroying days at times, but I'm always able to see those short-term losses as just a tiny part of my overall losses they incur in the short-term don't have any real effect on their financial stability. That way, when the bad runs occur, you know those setbacks are only going to make a small, temporary dent in your betting bank rather than clear your bank account. In those circumstances it's always easier to walk away from a bad day in action.'
While avoiding chasing losses is crucial to success, it's equally important to remember to stay disciplined after a winning bet. The temptation to increase stakes, or to make bets you wouldn't have otherwise after you've backed a winner, is another destructive habit to which many punters fall victim.
It's a failing not lost on Paddy Power Jnr of Irish bookies Paddy Power. 'The betting shop punter who screams home a winner, then immediately heads straight for the betting slip dispenser the moment his horse crosses the winning line is just the sort of customer any bookmaker wants in his betting shop,' he said. 'It's the guy who backs a winner and then walks out the door that I worry about.'
Even on the betting exchanges there's evidence of poor discipline. How many of the people laying horses who have races sewn up at 1.01 are actually just punters wishing to clear their funds in time for the next race without having to wait for their bets to be settled? Plenty of people will simply rush into the next bet because things are going well rather than quit while ahead.
Keeping a level head Bloom believes that staking the same amounts of money whether you're winning or losing is one of the key mindsets for any successful gambler. Look at each bet individually and place the right stakes, and you're on the right path.
'To make long-term profits you have to evaluate every bet on its own merits, never as a reflection of whether you're in front or behind on the day, month or year,' he said. 'The problem for many punters is their profitability rests not on how many winners they back, but the chronological order of those successes.
'To give an extreme example, if I knew I was going to back 50 winners out of 100 bets this season, I have the discipline to be certain that my profit would be exactly the same, whatever order those winners came in. But if every one of the first 50 of those 100 bets were losers, how many punters would still be in the game to back the 50 consecutive winners, even though the bets overall would have a 50% strike rate? Not many would have the psychological strength to keep their discipline after such a terrible initial run of results.'
The other area where punters often suffer a mental block is in their inability to separate the excitement of betting from long-term profitability. The excitement is obvious - all punters, casual or otherwise, enjoy the process of gambling, sometimes as much as the winning itself. As US racing's speed figure guru Andy Beyer once said: 'The next best thing to winning at gambling is losing at gambling.' But in the long run, it's the bets placed just for the thrill of the chase that destroy most punters' profitability. Never place a bet just to add entertainment to an event if you're serious about making money.
Winning to surviveThe correct-score or first-goalscorer tenners that punters bet 'just for a bit of interest' on a televised footie match are part-funding your bookies' new Bentley. As reported in InsideEdge last month, the bookies design certain bets to tempt you to punt.
But for pro punters it's a different story. With no other Revenue streams, they have to win to survive and so must adopt a very different mental approach. They can't afford to take risks or have fun on casual bets.
Every time they bet without doing the requisite research they're potentially jeopardising their lifestyle. Only by adopting a similar approach can you hope to regularly be in profit. 'Every punter ultimately has to make a decision,' Bloom said. 'Each of us has to ask ourselves whether we want to bet for fun or for profit - you can't combine the two.
'If it's for fun, then I have no problem with anyone having a gamble just to give them some entertainment during a sporting event with the chance of making some money. Those fivers and tenners lost to the bookies are no different from spending the money on a movie or a night at the bingo.
'But if you want to make a profit from betting, it's not about enjoyment, it's about making money - and that requires a completely different mindset. Long hours of research backed up by patience, discipline and an ability to detach yourself from the results, win or lose, are a psychological imperative for any successful punter - it's often a long way from fun.'
So there you have it. The main reason you aren't a winning punter is you. But don't take it to heart - the monsters that get into our heads and make chasing losses or placing an interest bet seem like a good idea are visiting us all. As one of the pros added: 'The psychological dimension of gambling is always the hardest to conquer because we are all human, and everyone has their own mental threshold.
'Any pro, however disciplined, who tells you that he has never gone on tilt at some point is either lying or dead.'
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